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Well, maybe I’m being melodramatic but this has been a year of less time to write. First off I had to step into a new role at work meaning my luxurious three day working week changed to four sometime during March.

Monday is currently my only day to write because try as I might, I can’t sit at the keyboard and simultaneously daydream while my partner’s home on weekends. I need complete silence to hear my own thoughts.

Image courtesy of Start Up Stock Photos

But Mondays weren’t always my own.

I was blessed with a new publisher who re-released my existing work and brought out three newbies. So some Mondays meant going through my editor’s, line editor’s or proof reader’s notes. I can’t be cross about that. It’s one of the advantages of having a good publisher.

The problem is, you start losing the plot.

Earlier this year I had to re-read my first several chapters to re-engage with my own manuscript. In recent weeks when I’ve written a few chapters I’ve wondered if certain characters still spoke the same way they did at the start of the book. I feel like this is the roughest first draft I’ve done in a while.

Image by Edar, courtesy of Pixelbay

There has been an advantage, though.

This tale, The Midnight Man, is about a middle aged man who meets an enchanting younger guy in his dreams, causing him to reevaluate his own life. When I started I only had half the book plotted. With time away I’ve been able to cement the story-line from random thoughts and real life experiences. The chapter by chapter breakdown is now complete, although I have a few new ideas to add to the tale.

Usually these additions are conceived between drafts. When complete, probably very late in the year, this first draft will have all elements in place so that in the next draft I can expand on some of the twists.

Photo courtesy of Pixabay

The irony is that I wanted to start this novel last year but other works demanded to be completed. In hindsight this was my instinct telling me that I’d need those new books this year for my new publisher.

In October I start a new position.

Same place, better working hours. I’ll be back to three days with some extra shifts from time to time to teach. I’m relieved. The Midnight Man can get the time it deserves.

It’s one of those years where things just seem to fall in place. My day job is moving forward with opportunities, and I got signed up to a new publisher after my former one folded.

I even got a contract for my non-queer novel which, although I had a gut feeling I would be offered, I also had a strange notion that something wouldn’t be quite right. My instinct was spot on! I was offered a contract which stipulated that I would receive no royalties until the publisher made back $US2,500 to cover the costs of editing, formatting, cover design, marketing, book proofs, printing and shipping, and legal fees. The term ‘vanity publisher’ came to mind.

The main character.

My partner congratulated me.

He was proud that I finally got a contract for this particular book. I didn’t reply to the publisher’s email. In fact, it took me a week to respond.

It’s hard when you want a contract so bad, yet you smell a rat. I went over my other contracts with other publishers and couldn’t go past the overcharging for services just to deny me my royalties. So before I actually said ‘thanks, but no thanks’, I let my social media friends know what was going on.

The futuristic city depicted in the manuscript.

People were alarmed on Facebook.

Everyone who responded was worried I was going to take the bait. Some of the comments included ‘I wouldn’t do it, Kevin. Find another way‘, ‘Do not sign. That is crazy. Better to indie pub than that craziness‘ and ‘Yeah don’t sign. Better to self publish.’

I know some very successful indie authors, so the notion of self publishing is less daunting then it was, say, ten years ago. Social media has made it easy to be seen in the right circles. And I know I could self-publish for half of what that dodgy publisher was claiming a book costs to release.

So I have a new project this year.

I’ve already arranged to have the manuscript edited by a person I have worked with before. I also know who I want as the cover designer even though I haven’t asked him yet. I’m catching up for lunch with an author friend who self publishes some of her work and always has the best advice. Another author friend who up until now has been traditionally published, is also considering her first indie release. We’ve joked about learning from each other as we go down that path. And I’ve made a list of actors to approach for the trailer. I hope they say yes.

More characters.

Do you have advice?

I’m going to keep blogging from time to time about this experience as its all quite new to me. But I also welcome your advice if you’ve self published. What should I be wary of? What was your most successful marketing method? How did you grow your social media?

I haven’t given myself a deadline except to say I want to have this work out before the end of the year. Apart from my writing, this will be a further push to my creative side.

Tomorrow I’m going to feel a sense of déjà vu as my first novel gets relaunched for the third time. My last publisher closed down, so I was very lucky that NineStar Press decided to re-contract my works.

An author’s first novel is special. It’s the one they sweated over. It’s the one that was redrafted more than any of the others. It’s the one where a budding author learns their craft.

Drama Queens with Love Scenesstarted as a handwritten manuscript titled Staging Life, and although I can’t remember how long ago I jotted down the first words into my journal, I can confidently say that it was over ten years ago. The original concept for the book had a cast of dead thespians acting in plays that taught them something about themselves, awakening them to lessons they missed while alive. As I wrote, the plot drastically changed.

In the first draft, friends, Allan and Warwick, visit Allan’s Uncle Bryant in Melbourne. The opening chapter was a slight ode to 19th century sci-fi as a large shiny rocket in the front garden takes the friends by surprise. The uncle and his poet girlfriend, Pamela, decide that Allan and Warwick should take the maiden voyage which they agree to, never believing for once this thing would fly. Something goes wrong and they find themselves in the Afterlife in the second chapter.

When I had this draft assessed, I was slapped on the knuckles for confusing the fantasy world with the real. I was told a rocket malfunction shouldn’t appear as a cause of death because it was fanciful and interfered with the world building of the Afterlife. I was also encouraged not to begin the book at the start, and to make Allan and Warwick’s death a mystery that unfolded in flashback . I took her advice and worked with her for several more drafts.

The original Charles River Press edition featuring Guy on the cover

When the novel was first contracted I was given an amazing editor. Her name was Mary Belk. Sadly she’s passed on since we worked together, but she is to this day the person who has influenced me the most in the way I write. She made me revisit my entire manuscript by combining chapters, dropping a character, and getting me to work harder in my ‘showing, not telling’. I worked for three months revamping the novel and had my doubts about her suggestions quite regularly, but as I sat reading the final draft from start to end, I realised she was right in everything she said. I wrote about Mary in another blog which you can read here.

The mysterious Guy, watching over Allan on the Wilde City edition of the cover

The next stop for my novel was Wilde City, a wonderful gay press who closed down recently. Through this publisher I got the much needed exposure to the right audience. More glbtqi blog sites picked it up for review. And as in the scant critiques that came out previously, my angel character, Guy, was still the most popular character. He has been described as many things including the emotional linchpin of the story. One reviewer claimed that they had even put in their own request to have Guy as their guardian angel. His popularity in this book has always surprised me. I even wrote a blog about it which lives here.

Since Drama Queens with Love Scenes I have written several other novels. The sequel, Drama Queens and Adult Themes, will be relaunched next month, as will my ‘not quite a romance’ novella, Nate and the New Yorker. But what’s equally as exciting as seeing these new editions find new readers, are the first releases of two more works. One of these is Drama Queens and Devilish Schemes, the third in the Actors and Angels series. And yes, there’s a horned character who I’ve named Preston in the book.

But for the time being I’m looking forward to my first born being reincarnated – fitting for a novel about actors in the theatre district of the Afterlife.

A blog which goes deeper into the story of writing this particular novel can be found here.

I’d like to welcome back Christian Baines to my website. When asked to join the team of authors sharing their thoughts on writing, Christian took a unique approach, and I’m glad he did. Today he offers perspective as he calls for certain characters in gay fiction to be fleshed out more honestly.

Plus he’d like to offer one reader of today’s guest blog any one of his novels, but you can read about how to enter at the end of this post. For now, he’d like writers to consider women.

All About My Mother (and my sister, and my aunt, and my best friend, and my daughter, and my high school beard…)

Thanks Kevin, for having me back on the blog! As I write this, we’re barely more than a month into 2017, and already two events this year that have inspired me. One took place when millions of women (and men, and others) who hit the streets across the world to stand up for women’s rights in what was the perfect response to a man who waves his misogyny and hatred in our faces like the world’s most graceless matador.

(Don’t worry, this post isn’t about politics!)

My other flash of early 2017 inspiration came through Pedro Almodovar’s newest movie, Julieta, based on the stories of Canadian writer Alice Munro. Cult figure Almodovar has been Spain’s most popular filmmaker since his breakthrough hit Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. He’s one of my favourites, and a huge inspiration when it comes to storytelling.

Pedro Almodovar

Weird as it may seem to link something as important as the Women’s March to a simple movie, both reminded me (as Almodovar’s films often do) of how much we, particularly as gay men, owe to women, and how we sometimes sell them short in our stories. For the uninitiated, Almodovar is an openly gay screenwriter and director who not only brings a gay sensibility to his films, but also tends to focus on female characters. You can see it right from his first movie, Pepi, Luci, Bom. In fact, a straight male is almost never the protagonist in an Almodovar film, and Julieta is no exception, being all about the relationship between a mother and her daughter. Sometimes, he plays them for comedy or eccentricity, tottering around the screen in Gaultier couture and high heels. But in his less comedic films, Almodovar’s women have become increasingly powerful and complex, nowhere more so than in Volver, a personal Almodovar favourite in which the male characters seem almost incidental.

Even though it’s tough to find a single healthy gay romance amid the broken embraces of these movies, there is one important question for gay fiction and romance writers to address.

How do you effectively bring women into your gay labyrinth of passion?

While bringing our classic pairing of two male MCs out in the live flesh, it can be easy to forget our female characters. They might slot awkwardly into overused tropes, or even come off as nasty obstacles to budding love. I’ve read women in gay romance played as bitchy homophobic relatives, or as bitter ex-wives or girlfriends…which is not entirely off limits. There’s definitely room for these characters and all of their dark habits. But as authors, we need to be careful not to reduce them to stereotypes. If they’re not properly developed, with real motivations for their nastiness, characters of any gender come off as cartoons. A male author writing such female characters looks misogynistic, and a female author writing them looks insecure, or at best, appears to be making some weird attempt to ‘protect’ her gay babies. While that formula might appeal to certain readers, it’s kind of condescending. It also doesn’t reflect the important roles women often play in our lives as gay men, and I’m pretty sure most readers can tell.

My experience is obviously going to be different to yours, but we each know who the important women are in our lives, and why. Maybe it was a mother or sister, who gave us the freedom to explore our interests and gender identity free of traditionally ‘male’ expectations. Maybe it was an aunt who inspired us with her eccentricity, or came down hard on us to build up the strength we now use to deal with prejudice. Maybe it was an understanding or inspiring teacher, coach, boss, colleague, or counsellor. Or maybe just that really good friend who played prom/formal beard, or took us to our first gay bar because we were too scared everyone was going to hit on the fresh meat, or who pushed us to go say hi to that cute guy who was so far ‘out of our league.’ Or maybe it was an acquiring editor who said ‘Yeah, this is good. Can you send me the full manuscript?’

Or, just the one who read something we wrote and told anyone that would talk to her about books to check it out.

Image courtesy of Voltamax, via Pixabay

It’s kind of impossible at this point to count the women who’ve played a role in my growth as a gay man and writer, or who’ve helped me in some way to feel comfortable in the skin I live in. But there are lots, and I’m pretty sure many other gay and bi men can say the same. There’s no strange law of desire, even in gay romance that says female characters should be any less developed in our stories. Sometimes they might even be a part of the romance (but oh, don’t get me started on the response I’ve had to doing that!). Sometimes they’re authority figures like Patricia Bakker, or lifelong friends like Isobel, who know the protagonist almost better than the protagonist knows himself. Sometimes they’re…whatever Mary is in Puppet Boy. All need just as much effort and development as your male protagonists.

One of my pet peeves in fiction (of any kind) is the strong woman. It’s a well-meaning cliché, but seriously? Men get to be smart, conflicted, snarky, insightful, reserved, assertive, etc etc etc… You will never hear a book promoted as having a ‘Strong male lead.’ Yet women are supposed to be satisfied or grateful if their representation is ‘strong’ and…that’s that? Really? We owe it to our female characters, readers, and the real women in our lives to go beyond this. ‘Strong’ should be the starting point of the character’s development, not the end. And if she’s not strong…does it really matter? Is there really no room in our fiction for characters who aren’t ‘strong’ (whatever that means)? In a character development pool of hundreds of potential traits, is ‘strength’ really the only way to make a character stand out in an interesting way?

Of course, good gay stories don’t need female characters in major roles order to be effective. Worse than an absence of women is a token character that’s been shoe-horned in there just to ‘represent.’ But it shouldn’t exclusively be an all-boys’ club either, because our lives aren’t. I’m so excited when I read complex, well realised female characters in a gay novel. Where it’s clear the author has thought about how important women can be to us, or is giving us an insight into a real woman who had a positive effect on their lives, or whatever. To me, it’s a sign gay novels have truly achieved mainstream acceptance, where gay love and sex is neither taboo nor fetishized, but is just another part of life, like the wonderful women we know.
Though I’ll probably never write a tell-all book all about my mother (insert ‘Christina’ gag here).

One thing I love about Christian Baines is that like me, he’s a film buff. So he has a question for readers who’d like to win any novel-length title from his backlist. Those who answer correctly will go into the random draw. The question is:

How many Pedro Almodovar movie titles are referenced in this blog post?

Thanks to Christian for being a guest blogger for the second time, and sharing his thoughts once again. His last post asked if there really is a happy ever after. You can read his thoughts on that topic here.

Until tomorrow, the only thing I have available to readers is a short story in an anthology. Over the course of this year my books (both previously published works and three new tales) will come out through NineStar Press. The first is a new ebook which I believe will be my only attempt at writing erotica.

From Top to Bottom is a short tale about three sexually adventurous men who, um, well, decide to become more sexually adventurous. I originally wrote this for my last publisher who, when first contacting them, was told that erotica and romance are what sell best. I wrote a romance that has been both praised and critiqued for not being true to the genre. As for this naughty novella, it was a challenge set by my partner and two friends.

It wasn’t easy.

My first contemporary novel, Drama Queens with Love Scenes (relaunching on April 17), was originally contracted to a small general publishing house in Boston. When it was first edited I received a nasty note from the head of the company complaining about the lack of sex in the book. He went on to say ‘How can you call this an erotic novel?’

That book was magical realism, and anyone reading that would have worked that out. There was never any discussion about it being erotic.

So the editor encouraged me to add sex scenes.

I protested once. It was my first book contract so I didn’t protest beyond that. I added three sex scenes to that novel, which to this day I don’t believe are needed. But they’re light scenes so they don’t distract too much.

She gave me advice on writing these erotic scenes, which I didn’t follow, but thought I should add in this blog for others who might like to know. Apparently, you sit on a towel, naked, in front of your laptop and just type whatever comes into your head. Don’t censor it.

Three days later go back as the author and tidy it up.

So how did I write the scenes for From Top to Bottom?

I’ll keep that a secret but will admit I had to find various ways to let loose and write. What I was more interested in was the characters and their journey during the story. Each one comes to terms with something different during their sexual exploration, each finding their new path with humour.

This week’s Writer’s Tips comes from a Canadian writer who has guest blogged here before. Last time he spoke about the importance of speaking up. You can read that post here.

Nathan ‘Burgoine

I first met him at the Saints and Sinners Festival in New Orleans, but due to my jet lag I didn’t get to socialise as much as I would have liked with my fellow writers. It’s a mistake I won’t make next time even if my eyes are struggling to stay awake.

Here are Nathan’s tips.

I recently sent in a manuscript for a novel, and the last steps involved something I’ve started to think of as my “Foible List.”

If you’ve ever been edited, you’ll know the slightly embarrassing realisations that come with the process. My very first short story, Heart, came back with a note about adverbs (I’m sure we’ve all gotten that note) and though I didn’t know it at the time, my “Foible List” had just begun.

The next short story I sent off? Before I sent it, I took a moment to re-read the story specifically looking for those adverbs. They were there. Even though I’d known it, they’d snuck right past my fingertips and onto the page. I removed most of them, and sent off the story.

I think with that story, I got my first knuckle-wrap for using the word “asked” when the dialog make it perfectly clear there was a question being asked. I made a note—a physical one, not a mental one—and then remembered the adverb thing and wrote it down, too.

The Foible List: a bunch of things to check before I send in my final copy.

Since then, I’ve added a lot of things to my list. Some of them have become a bit of an in-joke with my editors and fellow author friends.

For example? My characters smile like idiots and nod like bobbleheads. I was in a group workshop in New Orleans when this was brought to my attention, and it brought a welcome levity to the whole group (there’s nothing quite like having one of your idols compare your characters to “bobbleheads” by the way) and we had a good laugh.

In my first drafts you’d swear they had springs in their necks and had been sucking on happy gas. The smile-and-nod hunt is one of the first things I do now when I’m done a first run through a piece.

If you create your own Foible List, you’re making your writing better and doing your editors a favor (always a good idea). And it’s fun when you realise you’ve searched a draft and finally not found one of your old bad habits there. My most recent novel’s draft had almost no nodding whatsoever. I was really, really pleased.

Then I found over a hundred smiles.

You win some, you lose some.

Your Foible List will be your own, but there are three things on my list that I think more of as advice that could apply to every writer.

Image by kuzeyli, courtesy of Pixabay

Follow the Rules.

This seems basic, but especially in my first love—short fiction—I’ve heard so many editors talk about the number of submissions they receive that don’t follow the guidelines from the call for submission. Twelve point Times New Roman font might not be your favorite font, but before you send it in, follow the rules. Anything you can do to make your editor’s life easier is something you should do, and here’s the thing: what’s the message you send when you don’t follow the basic rules set up in the submission call? You’re saying ‘I don’t follow rules,’ or ‘I didn’t bother to read the instructions.’ What would you expect someone who didn’t follow the guidelines to be like if you offered critique or editing notes?

Basically? Treat the submission guidelines line a job interview. You wouldn’t show up dressed inappropriately, or without your resume, or with a cup of coffee and your slippers, right?

Read it Out Loud.

I find so many mistakes, repetitions, and just plain awkward moments when I read pieces out loud. I may look like an idiot walking around my house reading my book to my dog (who often walks away while I’m reading it—he’s a tough audience) but sometimes I notice he pays attention when I’m reading something I feel confident in, and so, yeah. Coach the Husky sometimes offers his seal of approval.

This is even more important if you’re planning to do a reading, or if you’re thinking of releasing an audiobook. On the page is different from out loud, and the two can inform each other with great effect.

Image by Unsplash, courtesy of Pixelbay

Line Edit Backwards.

If you’re like me, when you get to the line edit stage, you end up realising, over and over again, that you’ve stopped line editing and started reading. Line editing is tedious, and when you’re hunting for those last few typos it’s easy to lose focus and just read your prose.

So, along with reading it out loud, I learned another tip from a fellow author: start at the end, and go backwards. Line by line, backwards. I’m much less likely to get lost in the flow of the story, and I find my brain doesn’t substitute in correct words where the wrong words are written.

I hope you find those helpful. And hey, by all means, share your own Foibles.

“He raised his hands to an imaginary god” is one of my Foibles, Nathan. And I use too many similes. My intuition told me I should go through my unpublished work at the end of last year, and sure enough, I saw many repeated in different novels.

I also read aloud, but I do it before I start my writing day. I go over the last chapter completed to make sure it all sounds perfect. Of course, by the time the next self-edit happens, nothing is always perfect.

Thanks Nathan for your advice. To get to know this author, visit his blog. I just did and learnt about Great Jones Street, which is what I like about his blog. There’s always an update on what he’s been up to and as a writer, what to keep an eye out for.

Last week we met Nigel Bartlett, an author who resides in Sydney that I met at Melbourne’s Queermance Festival. Nic Starr also lives here in Sydney and I met her at the same event.

Nic dips between indie releases and romances for Dreamspinner Press, but I’m not going to say too much more about her as she’s written a lovely introduction in her guest post.

Over lunch one day, Kevin asked me about the tools I use when writing. It led to an interesting discussion about how technology can be used to complement a very creative process. Following that lunch, Kevin asked if I’d like to share that information on his blog. So here goes.

I come from a corporate background. I have always been extremely analytical and worked in the areas of process improvement and project management – data, spreadsheets, project plans and so on. My escape from all of this was reading and getting lost in stories, and eventually I started reviewing and blogging. One day someone (another m/m author) asked me why I didn’t write my own books. To be honest, I was surprised – it wasn’t something I’d ever considered, after all I was a process driven person, not creative. But the seed was sown, and now I can’t imagine not writing. However, I have managed to incorporate all my structured tools into my writing process. So, let me share some of those processes and tools with you.

Each of these tools help me streamline my process, manage information, and increase my productivity.

Scrivener – I adore my Scrivener! Scrivener is a piece of software that enables me to store my research, manage character profiles, and draft my manuscript. It allows me to outline my story and capture ideas. It makes a breeze of composing a synopsis, and can be used for formatting the final output.

Scrivener in action

Scapple and Aeon – Scapple and Aeon both integrate with Scrivener. Scapple is mind-mapping software. I use it as the first main step in my story development process. I brain-storm the story outline and capture in Scapple. I import into Scrivener, where each idea becomes a ‘scene’ in Scrivener. Once in Scrivener, I can re-order and modify as needed. Aeon is used to manage the timeline of my story. It’s particularly useful when working on series where you have overlapping timelines.

Dragon Naturally Speaking – I’m relatively new to the world of speech-to-text but I’m giving it a try and having some good success. I use Dragon Naturally Speaking when I’m sitting at my computer and it captures my speech and converts it to text.

Dragon Naturally Speaking

Voice Record Pro – This is a handy app on the iPhone (it might be available on other platforms but I haven’t checked.). I use this when I’m out and about, or not in front of the laptop. I record my scene or ideas, basically anything I want to capture. The app syncs to my Dropbox account so I can retrieve the audio files later. Once I’m back at my computer, I transcribe the recording using Dragon Naturally Speaking. Voila!

Pinterest – I’m quite a visual person. Pinterest is the tool I use to save photos and music etc, related to each of my stories. I do keep a lot of images in my Scrivener research folders too, but it’s nice to have the inspiration boards on public display in case any readers are keen to see them. The photos might be inspiration pics of the main characters, or rooms of the houses where they live, or recipes they’ve cooked, music they listen to, and so on.

Pinrest in Action

Evernote – Perfect for storing information. I use Evernote to manage lists of character names, future story ideas, and book title suggestions. I also clip articles to my Evernote that cover many topics related to the craft of writing and book marketing.

5KWPM – Another handy little app on my iPhone. I use it to do motivational writing sprints.

I haven’t gone into a whole lot of detail about each tool, but since I do get a lot of questions about my writing process, I’ve decided to do a more detailed series of blog posts on my blog in early 2017. If there’s something you’d particularly like to know more about, leave a comment and I’ll be sure to address it. I’ll also be inviting some authors, such as Kevin, to share their experiences.

Thank you so much for having me visit, Kevin. I’m looking forward to hearing how Scrivener is working out for you.

Nic xx

To find out more about Nic Starr and her books, check out her website.Thanks Nic. And yes, I love Scrivener, and like you, I record notes and quotes on my phone. You have me curious about Scrapple and Evernote, though. Something I’ll have to check out.

Next week will be our last Writer’s Tip for this series and comes from a Canadian writer who has been a guest blogger before on my site – Nathan ‘Burgoine.

This charming author resides in my own city, Sydney, but I met him in Melbourne. It was during the Queermance Literary Festival, a small event for us gay themed writers down-under. He also has the sexiest website for a writer I’ve seen so far. It’s perfect! Everything you need to know is on one page.

Meet Nigel Bartlett, the author of the Vintage/Random House release, King of the Road. This crime novel is an example of how far we’ve come in representing gay characters in the mainstream. The protagonist just happens to be homosexual, but this fact means little to the story. He just is, and that’s fine.

Here are Nigel’s tips for writing…

1. Don’t be afraid of the brick wall.

When I’m writing, I often reach a point in the story where I think, “Oh crap, now what?” That’s because I’ve put my character in an impossible situation.

In the past, I would panic at that point. I’d probably stop writing for a few days and wander around in a funk, thinking I’d have to ditch a few chapters, rework whole scenes, go back in time and take my character down a different path.

However, if I did that, I’d almost certainly find him facing another brick wall, and I’d be faced with the same decision all over again.

Instead, I’ve learnt that these impossible situations nearly always just seem impossible – and that they are, in fact, story opportunities. They’re opportunities to build suspense, have my character use his wits to get out of this situation and even for him to head off in a direction I’d previously never thought of.

In the old days the answers would come to me at random times – on the bus, in the shower, while chatting to a friend. That still happens of course, but now, instead of going into a panic and abandoning the writing, I brainstorm. I step away from the computer, take up my pen and notebook and I have a written conversation with myself.

“What would you do if you were in that situation, Nigel? What would your character do? What might he do that he’s never had the courage to do before?”

I write bullet points of crazy ideas, hare-brained options and ridiculous strategies – and out of those comes something workable and realistic.

Often these situations are quite mundane, but they’re vital to the story. For King of the Road, my character David had ‘acquired’ someone else’s iPhone, but he couldn’t get into it without the passcode, so I had to think of a realistic way he could do that. I had to think of a way for him to find out the passcode in a way that was realistic and wouldn’t make the reader think, “That would never happen.”

In another situation, David didn’t know the password to someone’s computer, so he simply couldn’t get into it – but that in itself became part of the story. David had to abandon the computer and use other means to find out what he needed to know.

For my next book, David wants to find out someone’s address, but the only information he has is a car number plate. I’ve managed to find a way of doing this, which I’m quite excited about. I wouldn’t do it in real life, but that’s because I generally avoid breaking the law. David, however, can do what he likes, because he’s fictional.

The other day I was discussing with a friend ways you could discover personal information about people without them knowing, and two cops walked past. I hope they didn’t hear me!

Image courtesy of Unsplash, Pixabay

2. Pay attention to life

Writers need to observe what’s happening around them. Indeed, it could well be the case that we’re writers because we’re observant, and that we want to put down on paper our reactions to what we see in the world.

These days, though, it’s far too easy to have our heads buried in our smartphones when we’re out and about. I’m as guilty of this as the next person, but I know that many of my best ideas come during those times when I’m watching strangers.

Waiting for a train, bus or ferry, walking to work, standing in line at Woolworths – these are all times when (if I’m paying attention) I can focus on the way someone walks, the way they smile (or don’t), the way they talk to someone else, the way they attack their sandwich, the clothes they’re wearing, their hair, their jewellery, the slogan on their T-shirt, the mole sprouting out of their neck.

I started writing King of the Road before the days of smartphones. I was in Brisbane once and waiting for a river ferry with my parents and some friends. I noticed a young guy also waiting for the ferry. He was in his mid-20s, tanned, dark hair, muscly arms, clearly a gym-goer.

The way he was standing reminded me of a Greek statue, and it seemed to me that he was quite conscious of the way he looked, the way he held himself – as if he was posing for an audience.

I thought to myself, “He’s so up himself. He thinks he’s a right Adonis.” I was being both dismissive and judgemental while also (reluctantly) admiring him for the effort he’d put in during his workouts.

Somehow, that thought became a line in King of the Road about one of the principle characters, a police officer called Fahd. And, in fact, it shaped his whole character and the way David views him. Fahd, with his Adonis-like attitude and David’s divided feelings about him, now plays a central role in my next book.

If I’d had my head in my phone, who knows what would have become of Fahd?

Image courtesy of Start Up Stock Photos

3. Push your boundaries

I’d never dreamt of writing a crime thriller. I thought King of the Road was going to be a literary novel focusing on a family’s trauma – how a family tears itself apart when a gay uncle loses the child he’s been looking after for the weekend.

In the first draft the plot was boring. It was full of angsty, blame-filled conversations, long silences and lots of rumination. Nothing was happening, and the people in my writing group told me so. One of them said, “Nigel, this is about a missing child – it’s a crime story.”

It had been years since I’d read a crime novel or thriller. I’d loved Agatha Christie as a teenager, but only as a guilty pleasure. In my late 20s I’d devoured John Grisham’s The Firm while on holiday. I’d also terrified myself by reading Silence of the Lambs after seeing the film (the book is scarier, just FYI). But I’d never thought about writing that kind of book.

When confronted by my writing group, I could have gone either of two ways: I could have ignored them and struggled on with a boring story with no plot that would probably never have been published. Or I could have risen to the challenge and tried something I thought was both:

a) beneath me (I saw myself as a literary writer) and

b) beyond my capabilities.

Strange, I know, but I used my snobbery about crime fiction to mask the fact that I both loved it and thought I couldn’t write it.

I chose the second path, but that meant doing something totally new and scary for me. I became a huge advocate of the motto “learn by doing”. I started rewriting King of the Road as a crime thriller and at the same time I taught myself about the genre.

I read Ian Rankin, Kate Atkinson, Peter Temple, Peter Corris, Patricia Highsmith, Jo Nesbo, Dennis Lehane, Harlan Coben. I read heaps and heaps of great crime fiction. I read one of Lee Child’s Jack Reacher books and I thought, “That’s what I want David to become by the end of King of the Road – a gay Jack Reacher. Fearless, independent, tough.”

I’d like to think I was a good student and learnt well. I learnt by reading, watching and (most importantly) by doing. I pushed my boundaries and went beyond them. I couldn’t believe it when King of the Road was published. It went on to be shortlisted for Ned Kelly crime fiction award.

For those here in Australia, you can order Nigel Bartlett’s novel at Booktopia, or for US readers, buy it at Amazon.

I met Michael Jensen online. He was part of a trio who organised a unique promotional opportunity for gay themed writers like myself. It was a fiction giveaway which resulted in gaining subscribers to our newsletters (so as a bit of shameless self promotion, feel free to subscribe to my newsletter – click here).

But back to Michael. He is an author and editor. His books of gay historical fiction include two series, The Drowning World, which is set in 5500 B.C., and The Savage Land, which takes place on the American frontier. Man & Monster, the second book in The Savage Land series, was a Lambda Award Finalist (under the title Firelands).

Michael is also the co-founder of AfterElton.com, which covered pop culture for gay and bisexual men, and eventually become one of the largest and most influential LGBT websites on the internet. In 2006, AfterElton.com was sold to MTV/Viacom in a multimillion dollar deal. As editor, Michael interviewed hundreds of writers, directors, and actors, breaking numerous stories and advancing the issue of LGBT visibility in Hollywood.

If you’re anything like me, you hear that word, think of a college term paper, and immediately get the heebie-jeebies. I mean, who wants to spend all of their time researching the economy of Papua New Guinea or the religions of southern Africa or the impacts of industrialisation on 18th century Pennsylvania.

And yet, any good novelist will have to do at least some research if they want the details in their book to ring true. If you’re writing a book set in Seattle, you need to know locals call the main freeway through town “I-5” and not “the I-5.” If you don’t, at least some of your readers are going to get pulled out of the story and wonder what else you might be wrong about.

And if you’re writing historical fiction, you’ll most likely have to do quite a bit of research. I know that sounds daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. And to help make it a little bit easier, I’ve put together some research tips for you.

1) Make sure writing historical fiction is for you

I know that might seem obvious, but sometimes the obvious things are the ones we most easily miss.

When I was in college, I got it in my head that I wanted to be on the water polo team because I liked swimming laps for exercise. So I went out for the team and pretty quickly discovered that playing water polo involved a lot more swimming than I ever wanted to do. Fortunately, I figured that out before I’d put months and months of effort into it.

So before you start writing historical fiction, first make sure you’re going to like doing the research because you’re going to need to do a lot of it. Think back to those term papers and research projects you had to do. Did you enjoy the work? Loathe it? Try and trick someone else into doing it for you?

Hint: If the idea of reading a non-fiction book about history makes you pull the covers over your head, you probably aren’t cut out for this.

2) Set aside time for research. Then set aside some more.

Obviously, this depends on a couple of things. How well do you know your subject already? How long a time span will your novel cover? How well known is the era you’re writing in?

The amount of time you’ll need to set aside for your research will depend a lot on those factors.

For my first two novels, Man & Beast and Man & Monster, I ironically had a lot of material for some topics, but a lack of material for others. Both books are set on the American frontier of the late 1700s, so I had a great deal to work with about how people lived, worked, dressed, and survived on the frontier. But the person my book was based on, John Chapman (you probably know him better as Johnny Appleseed) didn’t leave much of a historical footprint when it came to actual facts known about him. That meant that I didn’t have a lot to research about him, so I needed to do other kinds of research to plausibly capture what someone of his age and station in life might have been like.

If you really want to get the feel of your book right, you’re going to need to dive into the research so you can make the details of your world believable. You need to know how people in your era talked, what slang they used, even what kind of curse words they used. What kind of clothing did they wear? How was it made? You need to understand how politics, religion, and the government shaped the day to day life of your characters.

Honestly, the amount of research you can do is probably endless, which bring me to my next tip.

3) Know when to stop researching.

After nearly a year of researching Man & Beast, my husband sat me down one day and said, “Enough. Start the damned book!” And he was right; I had more than enough material to write my novel and get the details right. But I’d fallen into the trap of always wanting to know a little bit more, so I could capture the world a little bit better.

But readers aren’t reading to be dazzled by your research. They’re reading because they want to read a great book with a riveting story. And while your research is important and necessary because it helps build that story, endless descriptions of the streets of Boston or what the Queen of England ate will get in the way of your story and ultimately annoy your reader.

Knowing when to quit is a skill that comes with time, so don’t worry if you don’t get it perfect the first time out. I’ve got pages of notes I took never used in either Man & Beast or Man & Monster. But I’m totally okay with that because I wouldn’t have the facts I did use without collecting all of the other info, then sifting out the nuggets I wanted to use.

4) Reach out to experts.

One of the wonders of the internet is that almost everyone is just a Google search away. Can’t find out how a Russian fur trapper in Alaska in the 18th century might have travelled from Moscow to Sitka? I can promise you there is almost certainly some academic at a university just waiting to answer your question.

For Man & Beast and Man & Monster I needed help with some Delaware (technically Lenni Lenape) words that I wanted to make sure I had right. By searching online I was able to find an expert in the Lenni Lenape who was delighted to help me. Not only did that guarantee I had the words right, but by doing that extra research I was able to add a level of detail and authenticity of which I’m really proud.

So don’t be shy. Your expert will almost certainly be flattered to be asked.

5) Wikipedia is a great place to start, but that’s all.

I use Wikipedia all the time, both in my research and in my day to day life. But when I use it for research, it’s strictly a place to begin my research. As wonderful as Wikipedia is, it isn’t as nearly as trustworthy as a published book, an article from a reputable journal or newspaper, or an original source like a journal. When you do find something on Wikipedia you’d like to use, consider that only as your starting point. Go to the bottom of the page and check out the links to the sources provided. Check your facts there, then check them against another reputable source. Only then can you trust what you have.

6) Google Earth is awesome!

One of the most difficult aspects of writing fiction is the time and expense it can take to visit the places your story is set. Of course you don’t have to do that, but doing so can really add to the depth and texture of your story. But historical fiction can be especially tricky since the further back in time you go, the more that will have changed.

But there is still real value in seeing where your book is set, even if a great deal of time has passed.

My horror novel The Eye, is set on the Georgia coast and takes place both in the past and in the present. It wasn’t possible for me to actually travel to the book’s location, but Google Earth’s satellite images were huge in helping me place the exact setting I wanted. A crucial aspect of The Eye involves a hurricane striking Georgia in a very specific way, something I could determine quickly and easily by looking at Google Earth.

Google Earth and Wikipedia are both wonders of our modern era, but sometimes nothing beats going all the way back to the beginning. For Man & Beast, I was able to get my hands on some of the original journals written by the very first folks who settled the region of western Pennsylvania where my book was set.

Keep in mind, a lot of these kinds of resources might very well not be online. They’re just too obscure. But using inter-library loan, your local library can usually request those materials from another library system and have them delivered directly to your library. This can cost a couple of bucks, but is often well worth it!

Hopefully these tips will help you as travel back through time gathering all of the information you need to breathe life into your historical novel!

Michael Jensen has several books out, including the Lambda Award finalist Man and Monster. To check out his works and to read his latest blog posts, check out his website.

You meet a lot of people through social media. Whether you ever meet them for real is another story, but this week’s author sharing writer’s tips is someone I know through Twitter. And she’s a fan of a romance novella of mine so I know she has taste.

Meet Erin O’Quinn (Bonita Franks), a writer of gay fiction—emphatically not, she says, “M/M erotica.” Her novels, novellas and short stories all seem to have (gasp) a plot and, she hopes, characters who live on after the reader closes the final page. Her twenty-two M/M titles can be grouped according to their setting: in Scotland (12), Ireland (5) and Nevada (5).

She’s part of a growing list of mm writers who don’t believe one size plot fits all. Here are her tips…

Establish a voice

All writers learn by reading the words of people they admire. And at first, our work might sound too much like terse Hemingway, or poetic Vladimir Nabokov, or witty Terry Prichard, or the voice of thousands of other writing giants.

But sooner or later, the best authors find that inner harp to strum, that singular chord or riff that makes readers sit up and take notice. Your unique voice is developed with practice, and with sensitive attention to your inner rhythms. You gradually hone that voice until you just know when a word is right. And then a sentence, and so on, until the work is finished.

Show. Don’t tell.

Chekhov wrote,

“Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.”

Each time you write a page, return to it later and ask yourself whether you’ve captured the moment like a cinematographer: through a character’s tone of voice, in a well-turned metaphor, hiding among snips of dialogue, sliding between the clean, fresh sheets of a love scene no one has ever written before.

I don’t want to know that it happened. Show me how, and when, and why, and where, and whether it happened. Easy to say; hard to do. But I promise, you can do it.

Write for Yourself.

I realise I’ve just stated a heresy. The “experts” tell you to find an audience, and to aim for pleasing those readers. But I’ve found those readers are rather like myself—hyper and laid back, kind and evil-spirited, even-tempered and moody—in short, they are individuals who constantly change and grow. So instead of writing for some imagined John or Jane Doe, write to please you.

Even in a limited field like “gay romance” there are layers and levels of readers, of every sex. You will never in a bazillion years please them all. So look at your writerly goals. Do you want to be the darling of those readers who crave only the erotic fantasy? Do you care whether your name and titles are included on every list of “must read” authors? Are you afraid to cross genres? Then join the pack and write crap.

Or you can be true to yourself. Write to please your inner ear and to follow your own moral compass.

‘Open your listening ears,’ as Judge Judy says.

Allow your dialog to take the place of you, the author. You can wallow in irony, humour, symbolism, poetic flights—all through the mouths of the people in your story. But let them talk! Try for the natural rhythm and flow of verbal intercourse, and notice how you can write whole scenes and even chapters using dialog only.

I think the most successful writing is a blend of narrative and dialog. It need not be an even balance. But if you find yourself mired in paragraph after paragraph of descriptive passages, give your readers a break.

For me, the best dialog seems to my ear as though I’m listening in on a real conversation.

Make sure each speaker is immediately recognisable…through word patterns, vocabulary, cadence, syntax…but only if you’ve taken the time to make his or her voice distinctive from the get-go.

Forever bury those dialog tags! Especially when only two people are speaking, there is no need for the “he said, she said” tags that interfere with the conversation.

Do not fear the ungrammatical expression, or the ungainly pauses. How many of us speak like an orator, or know precisely every word we’ll speak before it’s uttered? In other words, keep it real.

Embrace your inner poet.

I’ll admit, my favourite writers are either poets, or they should be. I thrill to the music of internal rhyme, a well-tempered metaphor, the unexpected word, the oxymoron of internal dialog, a unique way of looking at a well-known face in the mirror.

We can be poets, and we should be poets, if we call ourselves writers.